Not a game fans are thankful for

Many Giants faithful won't get to see telecast because of TV dispute

By PETE DOUGHERTY Staff writer

Published 1:00 am, Thursday, November 19, 2009

Thanksgiving arrives a week from today, but New York Giants fans may face some indigestion with their turkey.

The Giants, arguably the most-followed professional sports team in the Capital Region, have a Thanksgiving night game against the Denver Broncos, but barring a last-minute deal, a majority of area fans will not be able to see the game on television.

The Giants-Broncos meeting is part of an eight-game package shown on the NFL Network, launched six years ago but still not picked up by Time Warner Cable, which services a majority of the Capital Region.

"Granted, this is a 24-7 network, but it's really the eight live games that are the sticking point," said Jeff Unaitis, vice president of communications for Time Warner's upstate New York region. "We're just not sure that it's worth that expenditure for those eight live games, when there's so much more we can do with our limited programming dollars."

Subscribers to satellite systems DirecTV and Dish Network can access the game. Others will have to go to bars, listen on the radio, or go without seeing a matchup of two potential playoff teams.

"It really is a shortsighted argument and one that's a little hypocritical to make that this is only an eight-game network," Kim Williams, NFL Network's chief operating officer, said Wednesday in a phone interview from California.

NFL Network is in its fourth year of airing live games. In addition, the network carried all 64 preseason games — all in high-definition, many of them live — and features extensive draft coverage, in-season studio programming and NFL Films shows.

Added to the negotiations this year is the availability of the NFL RedZone Channel, which airs live from 1 to 7 p.m. Sundays during the season and has live cut-ins from every game played.

"We have 53 million homes and more than 300 distributors," NFL commissioner Roger Goodell told reporters in Charlotte earlier this week. "Time Warner is denying customers the opportunity to see the network And it's not just the network; it's also the NFL RedZone, which we've had an incredible reaction to from fans and the partners who are carrying it.

The issue, other than the obvious financial considerations, is that the NFL won't allow its network to be placed on a sports tier. "We feel strongly that NFL programming is not niche programming," said Williams, who called RedZone "a great sports-tier product."

Cable companies pay networks negotiated monthly fees based on the number of subscribers. If a network is on a widely distributed tier, it will collect more revenue.

Williams confirmed that no formal talks have taken place since the NFL season started in September.

Negotiations for Time Warner are conducted at the national level, but Unaitis, who is based in Syracuse, said the company's stance is consistent system-wide.

"We continue to believe this is a channel that some Time Warner customers would like to see," he said, "but it's just a really expensive programming network offered the way that the folks at the NFL Network would like to offer it.

"We continue to negotiate. We believe when there's an offer that makes sense for us, we'd love to have it on, but I can't tell you that it's going to happen any time soon."